Reality
by fabricated fantasies
Summary: They are at war, and the only thing they can do is love. -The romances of the DA, includes SeamusLavender, BlaiseParvati and many others-


**a/n** For Bri (swirling-summernotes) and Mad (chasingafterstarlight), because I love them so much. Thanks to Bri for the fantastic beta job! =D

* * *

They're a little bit desperate and scared for their lives, so they cling a little tighter to each other than they would have otherwise, because if they die tomorrow they won't have time to regret what they've done.

* * *

_i. _**LavenderSeamus**

They are brought together again because of necessity, because she's lonely and so is he, and what better way to pass the time until something goes wrong again?

They've always had something between them, ever since they were fourteen and attended the Yule Ball together, because he liked (likes) the way her purple-blue eyes sparkle when she's happy, and she likes (loves) the way his hair can never lie flat. But it was awkward and kind of strange, and neither of them have ever mentioned it again after that, no matter how much they've flirted and reminisced since their seventh year began. He's male, not a Slytherin, and incredibly cute, and that's all Lavender needs right now. Besides, it's a lot easier to sneak into a boy's bed if he already lives with you.

"Shay?" she whispers into the darkness, feeling the cool sheets slide up her barely clothed body as she settles against his warm back, the rough material of his shirt rubbing against her shoulder. She briefly wonders if Parvati has noticed she's missing, even though the dark-skinned girl is rarely in their dormitory; with Hermione and Sophie missing from Hogwarts completely, the dorm feels empty, void of the games and laughter that usually occurred there.

Seamus grunts, pulling her back from her memories of the previous years. "Lav?" he asks, his voice heavy with sleep as he turns to face her, the blanket over them shifting slightly. She smiles as he pulls her close against him, her blonde hair shining in the soft moonlight filtering through the nearby window.

He smells like his hair has recently been burnt, which is more than likely, knowing him. Usually she would pull away in order to escape the odour, but she couldn't sneak in to see him yesterday, and she missed being tucked up beside him.

His hand slides underneath the blanket and ghosts over her curves, leaving behind skin that feels raw and tingly once he's stopped touching her. She smiles and places his hand on the dip of her waist and winds her hands in his hair. She presses her lips to his and kisseshim fiercely. He moves against her, and it is only when his foot hits the wooden bedpost with a clunk that she notices anything other than him. Neville shifts in the bed across the room, and he laughs, pushing her a little away from him.

"Not tonight, Lav – Captain Neville needs his sleep, and we don't want to deprive him of dreams about his Hannah, eh?" he says cheekily, though her hands are still tangled in his hair. She pouts at him, and he leans towards her, her heart beating faster in anticipation, though he just presses a surprisingly gentle kiss to her forehead.

Lavender lets go reluctantly and curls up against him, his hand returning to her waist as if it belongs there, because even though they aren't anything together, they still have _something_. She giggles as Seamus' lips brush against her ear, muttering words that are slightly slurred by his Irish accent.

'_expecto patronum, accio, confundus, expelliarmus, incendius, furnuculus, stupefy, protego, crucio…'_

* * *

_ii._**TerryPadma**

She's always been the sensible sister, the one who never gets into any trouble, so when Parvati tells her about the DA starting up again, she's hesitant to go back.

Sure, it was fine the first time, when they weren't learning anything, and the biggest consequence of joining it was to get detention. But Parvati's talking about being an active part of a war, a true flesh-and-blood war, where death is definitely an option.

Everyone else is so excited about doing something, about fighting back against the malicious detentions handed out for being a minute late, against Snape scowling fiercely down from his usurped throne in the Great Hall. She wonders why none of the people they are fighting against have picked up on the fact that something is happening. She sees with sharp eyes how Ginny and Neville and Luna are always together, whispering in dark corners and being so blatantly obvious about it all that they're going to get caught one day. She doesn't want a part in this, at least not yet. Not now.

Terry's the one who convinces her, in the end.

"Ravenclaws," he starts, his voice a little too loud for the silent library, though he softens his tone at a pointed look from a nearby fifth year. She almost rolls her eyes at his tone, a terrible habit she's picked up from her Gryffindor twin. Terry's well known for his long, winding speeches, and usually she can distract him with something, but Michael and Anthony aren't here, and public displays of affection are deeply frowned upon by the Carrows and Ms Pince.

"Ravenclaws," he says again for effect, "Are not like the other houses. Gryffindors are brave, Hufflepuffs are fair-minded, and Slytherins are cunning and able to be cruel. Ravenclaws, on the other hand, don't have a defining trait, and that is why we are worth do much to the DA." Her heart sinks with every few words that tumble out of his mouth, because she knows where he's going with this, and she wants him to accept that the answer is always no.

"We can be brave if we need to," he continues, feeling her hand stiffen in his, "and we are open-minded about most things, and we're detached enough to perform the spells the others can't. We need your spellwork, and your brilliant mind – and there's so much to learn," he says, his eyes brightening, a look she has seen many times before when he's debating with Michael and Anthony, or has just mastered a new spell.

"You're going to do this whether I agree to do it or not, aren't you?" she asks; before, she had been hoping against hope that he wouldn't fight without her, wouldn't _die_ without her, but he's got that light in his eyes that means he isn't going to let this go. She only wanted to keep the two of them safe, so that when this war ends they can pretend that it never happened, because Parvati's too headstrong to die, and Terry and Parvati are the centre of her world.

She wants a home in the city with a white picket fence and a husband called Terry who leaves for work every morning and comes back to her at night. She doesn't want bloodshed and conflict, and she tries to resist the part of her that wants to do something, because maybe she can't have the happy ending without fighting the dragon first.

He nods in answer, and she knows that that's the end of it. She's going to join the DA and fight for _him_. No matter how much she wants equality for all, and the end of all this horror, in the end she's selfish, and just wants them both to be safe.

"I'm in," she says, her voice crisp and making it clear that she's committed to it now, because once she decides to do something, she sticks to it.

He leads her out of the library and up to the seventh floor, fiddling with a golden Galleon the entire time, and she reaches into her pocket with her free hand, clasping the matching coin she started carrying with her a week ago. Neville is waiting for them next to the tapestry she knows so well, and they enter the secret room together, Terry's hand still clasped in hers.

It's all done very quickly – a wrinkled parchment is placed on a conveniently close table, and Neville hands a quill to her, checking the large clock on the wall every few seconds. They only have a handful of minutes before someone will notice that they have all disappeared, and they can't afford any suspicion.

She clutches Terry's hand a little tighter with her right hand, and dips the quill into the ink with her left. She presses the quill against the parchment and signs her name painstakingly below Dennis Creevey's, and at every 'a' in her name she almost stops.

The last letter is imprinted on the parchment; she has signed away her body and her mind, but she won't let them take her heart. That belongs to Terry alone, and this war will be about keeping him safe, even though he thinks he doesn't need her to.

(He's always been a little too Gryffindor for anyone's good, let alone his.)

* * *

_iii. _**NevilleHannah**

He finds her on the stairs one dreary afternoon, the skirt of her robes pooled around her where she's tucked up in the spot where stair meets wall.

The Carrows won't be happy to find her here, a half-blood polluting their hallways with her tainted blood and tears, so he walks over to her, carefully helping her to stand. One arm goes around her back as he mutters random phrases in a soothing voice, because what is _Neville Longbottom_ supposed to say to a crying girl?

The stairway is too dark to see, and he lights his wand with a muttered _lumos_, the portraits on the surrounding walls complaining at the brightness. He hears a shriek in the distance and groans inwardly at the sound; it sounds like Peeves, and that rarely bodes well for anyone, let alone two rebel students in the corridors after curfew.

He ushers Hannah up the stairs and along the corridor, trying to keep her as silent as possible until they can reach the Room of Requirement, the closest safe place he knows of.

"I need a place to hide with Hannah, I need a place to hide with Hannah…" he murmurs under his breath, the words suspiciously loud in the silent corridor. A door appears near them and he rushes over to it, still supporting a softly sobbing Hannah.

He props her up on a moth-eaten chair not far from the doorway, and watches her silently as her cheeks grow steadily paler and her eyes lose that feverish glow of slight insanity that is quite unlike the Hannah he knows.

"Do you, er, want to talk about it?" he asks her awkwardly, shoving his hands in his pockets and hoping that he doesn't sound too insensitive, because he really doesn't want her to start crying again.

"Dad's dead," she says flatly, the glow returning to her eyes again, and oh, he's stuffed it up again, just like he always has.

"I'm sorry," he replies, knowing the words are empty and hollow and don't mean much, but there's nothing else he can think of to say that doesn't sound even worse than that platitude does. She continues to talk over him, her voice increasing in pitch and tone, her words slightly slurred together because she's talking so fast, as if she doesn't get the words out now she'll never say them.

"And it's so close to Mum, you know, and they can't do that! They can't take everyone I love away from me, they just can't! And what if I die too, Neville? Then who'll look after their graves?" she cries, eyes looking at him pleadingly to say something to make the world disappear and make everything seem okay, but his throat is tight and constricted and none of the words are fitting past the giant lump in his throat. He can't believe he's forgotten than Hannah's mum died a year before, and now she's all alone, and he can't bear to mention the fact that Hannah might die. Somehow, he's never thought of her not being there beside him.

He's saved from saying anything when a bright blue Cornish pixie swoops down from the ceiling and starts tugging on his ear, the action reminding him of a day in his second year when a troop of pixies hung him from the chandelier, and he shudders nervously. Another pixie alights on his shoulder, and he brushes it off as if it's got Dragon Pox, but it just flies back, more and more of its comrades coming out of nowhere. A short, cautious laugh sounds from outside his bubble of anxiety, and he follows it, looking away from the mischievous pixies reluctantly.

Hannah appears to be the source of the sound; her cheeks are bright again, but not in the way that means she's going to cry again. Her eyes are still ghosted over with tumulus memories and fears and the continuing wish for this to all be a dream, but she's smiling, at least, and laughing a little. She looks too pretty in this moment for someone who's grieving, with her flushed cheeks and brown eyes with the tiniest hint of a sparkle, and no matter how inappropriate it is to think this way right now, he finds himself watching the way her lips curve in a smile.

He shouldn't kiss her now, because her parents are dead and his might as well be, and they're supposed to be grieving, aren't they, not thinking of kisses and passion and new love. But he wants to tell her that she'll still have him, will always have him, even if they both die in this war and neither of them ends up in the same place.

(Because she's so nice she makes _nice_ seem like a good thing, and he might just go to hell for some of the thoughts he's been thinking about her)

He kisses her then, and it's so much better than his first kiss with Parvati, because she's sweet and kind and soft and _there_, and they both need a little love right now.

* * *

_iv. _**SusanErnie**

The ring jingles in his pocket, the tiny cloth bag it's located in not doing much to smother the sound. Ernie looks around nervously, checking to see that the red-head walking beside him hasn't heard the tinkling coming from his pocket.

He worries to himself as they continue walking down the crowded corridor, his bulk moving people aside without him having to say anything, though they don't extend the same courtesy to the much more petite Susan, though she isn't exactly short.

'Maybe he's taking this too far, doing things too soon,' he wonders inwardly, the ring burning a hole in his pocket like it's on fire. They've been dating less than a year, and maybe it's the fact that they're about to fight for their lives when the end of the year comes, or when Harry arrives, whichever comes first; or maybe he wants to show her that there's a future after all this, but he bought her a ring yesterday, and at just over seventeen years old, he's going to propose to the girl of his dreams.

He stresses about asking her, more than the anxiety wasted over exams and first kisses and the quality of his robes compared to everyone else's, because what if she doesn't say yes? Oh, he's seen the hopeful smiles she gives him when she thinks he's not looking, and the way her lips part in happiness when he says something clumsily sweet, but there's always a chance that she'll think they're going too fast.

He kneels on the wooden floor, her pale hand clasped in his callused one while the other grasps the ring and he looks up into her nervous and smiles.

"Susan Amel-" he starts, the words sliding from his throat like they were meant to be said, all thought fleeing his mind. Before he can continue she smiles, her expression matching his, and pulls a silver band from her pocket. She slides it onto his finger, and their eyes lock, thoughts tumbling between them with all the words they don't need to say, bar one-

"Yes."

Her words reach his ears, and all the doubts rush back into his mind, because what if he dies, or she dies, or they both die, or they find that all of this was created by the need to feel something with somebody before they might possibly die.

He stands to take her in his arms, and her lips smoulder against his in just the right way that tells him that she means it, and he means it, and all their doubts fly out the window, chased away by the wind of hopes and dreams.

They're far too young, but none too innocent, and they're ready to take this step, _together._

* * *

_v. _**JimmyMegan**

He expects her to go easy on him, because she's a Hufflepuff, and that automatically makes her soft and sweet, and Hufflepuff house rarely churns out the fighters. Everyone knows that. Gryffindors have the heart and courage, Ravenclaws have the skill and finesse, and Slytherins don't care who they hex. It's just the way things are.

They face off against each other, one duelling pair in two long lines of battling people, and she narrows her eyes at him, her face full of determination. He's surprised by her stare, because sure, she's already beaten two other duellers today, but one was Dennis Creevey, and Morag's still off her game from her last detention with Crabbe and Goyle.

A beam of silver light flashes into the air above their heads and she strikes almost immediately, uttering a curse he's never heard before, her wand simultaneously shooting out turquoise sparks. He flings himself out of the way, his left arm hitting the person beside him, but he doesn't have time to look as he dodges her next spell. He thanks his mum for giving him his shorter than average frame as Megan's hex soars over his head, missing him by a centimetre.

He flings a spell back at her. It hisses through the air towards her before it stops in front of its intended target, held back by the older girl's silver shield.

They circle each other for a moment, a fragment of time that stretches into endless minutes, their eyes locked and bright with fierce determination. She appears calm and steady, while his own heart is hammering inside his chest as he waits on tenterhooks for her next move. It's only a training fight, but the only rule is that they can't injure each other _too badly_, and it feels as if Voldemort himself is standing in front of him as he prepares for their duel to the death.

A cry sounds from amidst the dust generated from the transmogrified stone walls, a shriek that sounds like Susan, and Megan breaks their charged gaze, whipping her head around to find the source of the sound. Susan, Megan and Hannah are as close as sisters, the Hufflepuff trio, and they feel each other's pain as if it's their own. A look of complete and utter panic is splashed across her face, as if she too has forgotten that this is only practice, and none of them are aiming to kill - at least not tonight.

Her wand dangles uselessly at her side as she peers into the clouds of stone dust, and he should stun her while she's unarmed as Ginny has taught them to do, but there's no glory in felling someone who can't fight back.

Ginny rushes by then, chasing a fleeing Zacharias – the most uneven pair he's seen tonight – her red hair pinned back tightly. "Finish her, Jimmy!" she calls, sending a jet of light after the arrogant Hufflepuff.

He reacts automatically to her command, his body switching to autopilot, casting a spell at the frozen figure, who has so far remained miraculously untouched by any stray spells. She turns slightly to avoid the spell and flicks her wand at him, a silver spark blossoming from the tip of her wand and making its way towards him before he can even think of moving. He slumps to the floor, his body as stiff as a wooden board, waiting for the silver flash of light to signal that the training battle is over.

He's lost to a _Hufflepuff_; but then, this particular Hufflepuff could have been a Gryffindor.

The beam of silver appears, and she comes over to give him a hand up as the feeling returns to his body. "Thanks," he mutters, and she smiles, pulling him up with a strong grip cultivated from working on her family's farm, and a tingling feeling spreads throughout his hand at her touch.

"No problem," she replies, letting go of his hand, though the tingling feeling doesn't disappear. "And next time, I promise to let you win."

"And next time, I promise to beat you without your help," he grins back, and he watches her smile widen as she turns away from him to find her friends. She's funny and pretty in a quirky way, and he finds himself looking forward to the next DA meeting more than ever. They never would have met without this war, without the need to fight against everything that's wrong at Hogwarts, but maybe she can be his light in the darkness. As soon as he asks her out, of course.

* * *

_vi. _**RomildaMichael**

It starts because they're at war and everyone is expected to do their part.

"Michael, you and Romilda will work together as half of our healing unit. You are responsible for maintaining the potions required for healing, as well as strength potions, and anything else you or I deem needed," Neville orders them, and Romilda smiles wickedly at him, her slightly too bright lipgloss glinting in the light. Michael's heard of her crushes, and the ways she tries to get her victims to reciprocate her feelings, and he curses his parents for making him so handsome.

Her smile reminds him of a lioness about to catch her prey, and he looks away from her, casting a 'why me' look over his shoulder at Susan and Terry, who have been assigned to work together as the other half of the healing unit.

He lets it go – it's for the cause, after all – and finds that Romilda is surprisingly tolerable when she's focusing on something other than boys and her own vain thoughts.

When Morag MacDougal is practically carried into the common room, supported by Terry and Su Li, a long jagged scar down her face dripping bright red blood, looking so blank and pale that at first she appears to be dead, he immediately signals Romilda with his Galleon. He trusts her enough and there isn't anyone else to help him with the potion making side of things; Anthony's hopeless and Terry's already got his wand out to start trying to heal the myriad scars peppering her left arm. Besides, if he didn't contact her there would be hell to pay at the next DA meeting.

He lets her in through the porthole when she arrives at the tower, and brings her upstairs to his dormitory where Morag lies on Kevin's bed, her face still ashen. This is the only place they can put Morag, really, because the boys can't access the girl's dormitory yet, though they're working on it, and it would scare the younger students to see their housemate bleeding half to death in the common room. It's risky to have one girl there, let alone two, especially since one is a Gryffindor, but this is a war and these are risks they have to take.

"Do you know what happened to her?" he asks Terry, who doesn't look up from Morag's arm, while Romilda pulls a tiny cauldron and a jar of bluebell coloured flames out from under Terry's bed. He doesn't really want to ask her how she knew that was there.

"Cruciatus curse mixed with some sort of wound causing curse – I can't get the bleeding to stop. It was Goyle," Terry adds, his tone short and clipped, and Michael simply nods and joins Romilda in the corner.

It's almost four in the morning before they heal Morag completely, and he looks around the dormitory, his eyes threatening to close. Terry has passed out on Anthony's bed with him, too tired to move, and Kevin is curled up in a chair in the corner. Only Romilda seems awake, sitting on the end of Kevin's bed, and as if she has sensed him watching her, she turns around to meet his gaze.

"You could have been a Ravenclaw, you know," he says to her, "with that sort of skill."

"Why would I want to be a Ravenclaw? Gryffindors are the best house – we're brave, loyal and better looking than you Ravens," she replies, and it's only then that he sees that her eyes are dulled by sleep, though her wit remains sharp, it seems.

"Better looking, hmm?" he asks, teasing her as much as he can force himself to, with the pounding in his head disturbing his every thought. But it seems right, somehow, like they are almost friends, because they've worked together for months and he once refused to torture her, and got tortured for it himself. Suddenly he feels bad for wishing he had just tortured her after all, on those rainy days when she just wouldn't stop talking.

She grabs his hand impulsively, and he notes with dull surprise that he has made his way towards Kevin's bed without even realising. She looks up at him, daring him to say something or to remove his hand from hers, but he's too tired and she seems less obnoxious at four in the morning.

And maybe Romilda isn't as awful as he thought she was.

* * *

_vii. _**ParvatiBlaise**

She's surrounded by people who are preparing for war, to fight and kill and probably die, and she's right there with them, pledging her soul to the cause.

There was never any doubt to which side she would take, because Parvati might be insensitive and flirty and slightly narcissistic, but she's a Gryffindor at heart. She was born to fight this war.

But she keeps meeting a boy in the corridors, a boy who has never chosen a side, not even hers. And they might have been doing this (whatever it is) for almost a year now, when she was lonely and hurt and he was just there, his silence comforting her when she was left alone by Lavender time and time again so that her best friend could chase Ronald Weasley.

She's about to die – she knows it's a definite possibility – and she needs his silence to escape from the sound of spells as they shoot past her ear, or the gurgle of healing potions to nurse their injured back to health. The pressure gets worse and worse, and their silence becomes more, until her frustrations become open mouthed kisses on his neck and her fingers tangled in his hair.

She doesn't know what he's getting out of it, besides hooking up with a beautiful girl every now and then, but he's willing to be used by her, and that's all that matters right now, in the months and weeks and days before the end.

She's loud and loyal and brave, and he's cunning and silent and quick-thinking, but their bodies fit together like a lock and a key, like they were made to fit like that, so close and intimate; so completely opposite to how they should be.

The danger grows stronger by the day. The last time she sees him before the battle is a few hours before the Carrows finally chase her into the Room of Requirement.

"If I die, don't come to my funeral," she says to him, her brown eyes looking at him steadily, because even if he doesn't know about the plan to fight as soon as Harry arrives, there's a possibility that they'll kill her before that, just like Edwin Runcorn and Annabelle Jones and so many others. And she doesn't want her friends to know that someone like Blaise Zabini cares enough – knows her enough – to come to her funeral. If she even gets one.

He says nothing, his eyes blank and cold as always, but there's a little crease in his brow that tells her he's thinking hard about something. The thought that she knows him well enough to know these little things about his frightens her, and she leans in to kiss him again, an age old technique to rid herself of things she doesn't want to think about.

It's risky, to be kissing in a corridor after curfew, no matter how remote a corridor it might be, and she's supposed to despise him for following the Carrows' orders and Cruciating other students. She might have given away her soul to protect the ones she loves, but her body and her heart still belong to him.

* * *

_viii. _**ColinDemelza**

The sky is dark that night, arcs of colour shooting across it like brightbrightbright stars and shimmering fireworks. The figures below it cross wands and souls and beliefs, each with the intent to kill, because the only other alternative is to die. These warriors, brave and young and old and cunning and weak and blind; all have too much life left to live. They will not let tonight be their final moments, no matter which side they have chosen.

Demelza ducks as a ray of green light arches down from the staircase towards her, wincing as it grazes the top of her head, leaving the hair there frizzled and black-looking. She doesn't stop running, though, the beat of her heart feeling like it will burst through her ribcage at any second, because she hasn't seen Colin since the battle started, and she can't do all this without him. She's come too close too many times, and she shouldn't be here anyway, but she hasn't told him yet, and she has to tell him tonight. Just in case.

A thin figure catches her eye, and she strains to make out who it is through the haze of spells and plants and blood, because it looks too much like Colin to be anyone else. The person who attempted to kill her a few moments before confronts her now, and she hexes him quickly before dashing after the other figure.

She sees Lavender fall at the base of the staircase, being pushed to the ground by a feral faced man, but she doesn't have time to stop or help, besides sending a Stunner over at the pair, because Colin's right in front of her and a Death Eater is right behind. She will not die tonight, she promises herself, refusing to think about the possibility of tempting fate. She's never believed in that sort of rubbish, anyway.

"Colin!" she shouts, her cry muffled by the sounds of battle behind her. She leaves the Great Hall and speeds back outside, blood running down her arm from a wound she never knew was there. The sky outside is bleeding white from a moon that wavers in her sight, and she looks away from it to find that Colin has disappeared.

But she has to tell him tonight, in case she dies or worse, he dies, because she can't bear for either of them to go without both of them knowing exactly what they've done. Sure, it's foolish, but if she survives tonight (if they both survive) she's going to keep this baby of theirs, because it's a half of each of them. It doesn't matter that she's sixteen and vulnerable and a year off leaving school, because she already loves it, even if no one knows about this baby but her.

A loud, cruel voice permeates the hall, and she listens with stunned disbelief as Voldemort tells them that they will be spared, because he is apparently merciful, and does not wish to spare any magical blood. Some mercy.

People start pouring into the hall, each new face providing relief and horror, because for every fighter who was strong enough to make it here, there is another in their arms who is dead or too badly injured to make it here themselves. A girl flies towards her from the other end of the hall, a blaze of curly black hair and dust, wrapping her arms around Demelza as if she is the last drop of Amortentia on earth.

"Have you seen Colin?" she asks, her nose buried in the torn fabric covering her friend's shoulder, breathing in deeply. She's warm and safe and far from dead (for now), and all she needs to complete this exhausted happiness is to see her boy hero.

Romilda's breaths stop abruptly in Demelza's ear, and the other girl starts babbling that she's so sorry, so sorry, a shaking finger pointing at a shape lying in the dust. And the world dims a little as tears blur her eyes, and a harsh scream tears from her dry throat, because there's a thin, frail little body at the end of the line of dead, and she refuses to let it be his.

She pulls free from Romilda's embrace, her eyes passing over the other bodies lying on the ground as if they aren't even there, though her frozen mind registers the presence of Morag and Sally-Anne, and a boy with bright-blue eyes that she vaguely remembers. She stops before one of the bodies – _his_ – looking down into his dull brown eyes.

"How could you leave me!" she cries, her voice harsh and grating and burning through her throat. "You promised! Alway- always and forever, remember? You and me, and your mum and Dennis, remember? Remember?"

She doesn't have the strength to yell anymore; the pain has crippled her heart, and with it her body, and she sinks down beside him. Her head rests against the burnt cloth of his robes, and she pulls his stiff hand to encircle her, as if he's still alive and well, and this is just another evening spent together curled up in the Gryffindor common room with a crackling fire and his camera.

His fingertips rest against the base of her abdomen, perhaps by accident and perhaps not, and she remembers a night full of ghosts and laughter and passion, when they were a little too foolish and a little too wise, and the war seemed too far away, and yet too close. His hand presses against the flat plane of her stomach where a second heart beats, and her exhausted mind spends a moment to hope that their baby looks nothing like him.

* * *

Their minds and hearts and souls beat as one, as the world tears apart around them and they find scars marring their skin that will never fade. They are at war, and the only thing they can do is love.

* * *

**a/n **Please review! =)


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